[IC] Young Justice: Covert Ops

[Stryder]

Mason was slightly relieved by her lack of knowing, if they weren't assigned then he could just choose whatever room he wished. He was slightly in wonder about whether she was right or not since he had seen the way her room looked, her costume was in there so they must be designated rooms. "On the other end?" He questioned her, he didn't know much about the place so navigating would take some time doing, he glanced down the hall, there were so many doors, he wondered how he'd even know what was what. When offered to walk with him he managed a small smile, she was willing to help him, that made him feel pretty confident about finding his room whether it was assigned or not.

"Um...okay.." He said to her, his smile never seeming to fade, she looked to be in the middle of unpacking though. Part of him wanted to tell her he'd be fine but he didn't like the idea of wandering around aimlessly in Mount Justice. He moved his head away from the doorway that he had been peeking in to, after the girl stepped from her room he began to follow her lead, walking to the right of her. "M-my name is Mason...what's yours?" He said, introducing himself to her as he walked, he asked her name, if she was a teammate then getting to know her would be a good idea. He was a bit more curious about each room, maybe he'd find his room soon.

[WitchChild]

After having studied the fight between X and the spider boy, Mindjack had expected projectile attacks so he set up a weak but effective kinetic field around him so that the webs that were meant for him seemed to have splattered across an invisible wall."Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeah. I don't think so" He said to the X and dropped the field, the webs falling down. He wasn't capable of doing what he was about to do and keep a barrier going, too straining. As the barrier was down he seemed to throw a wild punch into the air. What was happening though was a fist sized ball of kinetic force going the speed of a bullet right towards X's chest.

---

Nothing interesting seemed to be in the global news, some minor crimes here and there but nothing that the literally the vanilla law enforcers could handle. No one seemed to be joining Elin so instead she turned the screen off and decided to have a walk across the base. She had already set herself in her room so she didn't need to figure out where to place her wild roses (Which were pretty much everywhere). She instead figured to see if there was a place where she hadn't explored before.

As she walked outside once more where she was more comfortable, she saw the two wolves were and she could feel their mental conversation but she couldn't hear it. What she could also feel that they weren't really regular wolves either. She heard about one of them but the other was new to her.

[Demon Shinobi]

Nathaniel face palmed as he listened to the cloaked teen. "Okay. Listen. Even if the room does have a door that doesn't mean it's a bedroom." He said calmly. "Now you can... Um... You can..." He started to lose his train of thought when he saw Rachel. Is... Is she doing this on purpose? I mean... Damn she's soo... No... Dude... Stay focused. He shook his head snapping out of it. He glared at the weird teen who he'd already fought once or twice. "Two choices. You pack up and go the easy way. Or I'll have to beat some sense into you." The teen was being serious but even so he couldn't help, but discreetly look at Rachel from the corner of his eye. She was so hot. God all the girls on the team were. It was like paradise only there were other guys around. Guy's like this one who might cause more trouble than they were worth. Still they could also end up saving his life. He did want to make friends with everyone. Maybe the girls more. And maybe... Crap... Why was Rachel there?! Why now?! He couldn't focus.Still he kept his eyes on the teen in the cloak. He couldn't back down now after all.

---

Red X laughed a little. "You don't have a choice Nutcase. Or was it Weirdmind? Actually did you even give me a name?" He asked before feeling the impact of the fist. He was sent back a bit. "Heh... You're pretty good." Red X actually complimented before a motorcycle race over head having used a car as a ramp and it's jets to get up overthe roof. He shot a grapnel line at it and propelled himself up and onto it. He hit a button releasing a few flash bombs down onto the two heroes. "See ya later losers!" He said laughed a he continued to ride down off the roof.

[Avenger]

She was late, very late, and it was the dumb Bat's fault.

Of course, she would've been killed if she said that out loud, or to him at all... She hoped there wasn't a martian near by, or someone who could read minds, because she'd surely hear it from him later. But how could she have not thought that way? Her old man had been like this for weeks, since she had finally gotten him to agree to put her on this team. It took hours, days of begging alone just to get him to listen, so she thought that would be the end of it, but apparently, he was relentless. Sometimes she wondered if he had a bit too much determination. But then again, she had more. No matter how many times he tried to slip her up, trick her, or scare her into disagreeing, it never worked that well. She'd pretend to act like she'd give in, but always turned around and decided she was still going through with it. In the back of her mind she wondered why she hadn't noticed last night what the sneaky old bat was trying to do.

He'd kept her up a lot later than usual, keeping her constantly training for "tomorrow", tiring her out so she'd sleep in. He took it another step when he disabled her alarm clock, just so she'd sleep past the time they were to meet up at the new base. Once she woke up, she was agitated nobody had bothered to come and get her, and decided she'd have to find her own means to go after them, but they seemed to be running a bit late, too. They hadn't left yet.

So she went along for the ride, and once they arrived at the base, had made sure to stay out of Batman's eye for a while, to go explore, knowing what sort of speech he'd have already, or whatever he planned to say. There were no animals, nothing really on the island, but it was beautiful. Her teammates had gone along in, and she came out to talk with Batman, for only a brief moment. He was disappointed, maybe agitated, she couldn't tell, he kept a firm face, even when talking to her. She'd replied with snarky comments, and some smug ones, she'd gotten this far. Then he'd told her to keep Nathan out of trouble, which she knew she'd already have to do anyway. His poor harassment of most girls on the team (or any, anywhere) could become taxing, even if you weren't the target. Though, she didn't remember when she opted from sidekick to babysitter. Even still, she wasn't much better herself, she was a flirt among women and men.

The doors had closed and everyone seemed to have gone inside... maybe she could sneak up on the poor boy, scare him away from whatever person he was currently annoying. It was funny to see him startled. But how would she get inside, unnoticed... The windows were an appealing destination, and it was convenient enough that she saw him in the room already, talking to some... boy... with a mask. They didn't seem to be very happy, and she sat back to listen, smirking at the basically pointless conversation. They must not have been a native...But they surely weren't a martian, or anything she knew of. She was sure there were records on him though, she'd check them later, when need be.

Gently pushing the window open, she knelt on the windowsill and watched the two, knowing a fight would outbreak any minute. "You know, KF, you could just get one of the league to deal with him, right?" Robin asked, lifting an eyebrow to go along with her smirk. "When Batman told me to keep you out of trouble, I didn't think I'd have to as soon as I got here. Then again, it'll be fun to see him take you down, so I might let it slide... There's too many cute girls here for you to have the willpower to pay attention to the fight."

[Reaper]

Rachel smirked as she noticed Kid Flash giving her his attention and getting very distracted. Hoping to avoid making eye contact and letting him know she was intentionally doing this, she started some gymnastics exercises on the bar showed off her flexibility and moves, before flipping off the bar, performing a somersault and then smashing her elbow into one of the training dummies, breaking off its arm, all in full view of Nate. She finally flashed him one of her murderous smiles and turned around and walked away to finish the rest of her workout. Some girl had come and greeted Kid Flash, and Rachel remembered her as Batman's sidekick, Robin.

Well, that was fun but now it's time to get serious. She silently commented as she headed into the combat simulator and loaded up the training program. As far as she was concerned, she only really listened to Artemis and even then her mentor had no end of troubles keeping her in line. Shadow had a problem with people touching her, and whenever someone did lay their hands on her she would proceed to kick their ass or draw her knife, which was problematic at best. So far she was thankful that none of the team members had tried such a thing.

The combat simulator sent a handful of goons after her and she proceeded to draw her knifes and throw them. Since they were all holograms she didn't have to worry about letting one loose that would end up hitting the others by mistake. Though she was certain if any of them did walk in on her now they would be concerned at the brutality of her strikes - all her knife throws were fatal injuries, and she didn't pull any punches when fighting in melee with her daggers either. It was difficult to undo years of training and conditioning to kill as efficiently after all. Even Artemis was resigned to giving her nonlethal knives to work with in order to prevent any deaths. Though she was certain Batman would have words with her about that, the meddlesome dolt he was.

[Demon Shinobi]

Nathaniel found it increasingly hard to focus when he looked at Rachel. However, what tipped the scale was the appearance of his good if not best friend. "Really? The gorgeous queen of flirting is gonna try and talk about OTHER girls distracting me?" He spoke turning his attention from the masked teenager to the young ward of the big bad bat. he couldn't really believe she was here. He was sure Big Daddy bats wouldn't allow it. Especially since Nathaniel was on the team. The two were best friends, maybe a little too close for the bat's comfort at times. It was all in good fun of course, but that was besides the point. This may have been one of the dumbest things Nathaniel had done today. It didn't even cross his mind. He was focused on Robin. And then Rachel The murderous smile really excited him more than it should have. He didn't have a hard on or anything drastic like that but still. He'd picked a fight, even if it wasn't his intention, and now wasn't paying attention to his possible opponent. He was staring at two girls who in his mind were hotter than any girl he knew back home and were both leagues above countless female heroes he'd met. Actually... Why were the girls on the team so hot? Was this like a test for him? Like specifically? Lead the team and fight the good fight while trying not to drool all over them? Now he was shifting from thinking the paradise was slowly drifting into the hell side of the spectrum. He couldn't let that happen now could he?But right now he had to focus on the... the masked teen? No... Robin was more important now. Even if she wasn't... he was a lot better to look at.

[Dystopia]

After Ember had made a pile of books he had to read out of all the bookcases, he happily started through them. He was pretty sure he could live here forever and never leave. As if on cue, his cellphone buzzed. He pulled it out of his pocket because his mom would do something like ground him from playing with what she called 'his super little club'.She wouldn't even care if she had to rent a boat, charging it on the Justice League for it because she was a working mother dammit, find Ember, and drag his fiery butt all the way home. She had all the right to do just as she had threatened and probably would if Ember started procrastinated in replying to any and all text messages and phone calls she set him.

Sighing in grief, Ember closed the book he was reading. And yup. That was a text message from his mother. A lot of roundabout ways asking if he was still alive a she'd come get him or send his brother to get him if he wanted to come home. She probably would send his brother and that'd be the worst. His brother had the super ability to be stressed and, being in law school, Ember totally understood. Picking up Ember from a secret island base probably would take away precious studying time.He sent back a very detailed 'I'm-still-alive' text message and then left his room. Or, in other words, the library he was going to drag a mattress in. He needed some hot chocolate or something.

[Spriggs27]

Sayaka had been wondering around the base for hours, she was just listening to the vast amount of actions that were going on in the base and it started to give her a mild head ache, she walked into the garage hoping that it wasn't going to be boisterous and hectic, when she entered the garage, she was tempted to turn around and leave but she knew she couldn't leave one of her allies in distress, she unholstered her rifle and started firing darts at the monster. When she noticed it wasn't working she took out her grenades and tossed one into the Mud monster.

[Drakel]

The cloaked teen looked at the other teenaged boy as he was trying to explain the masked teen listened to his explanation but soon the other teen stopped and looked out the window. The Magic masked teen also gave a quick glance to see what he was looking at, only to see the other human woman show her acrobatics skill. The masked teen narrowed his eyes, not truly liking her but still had no reason for such other than her actions with the knives and personality, which even he slightly admired for a human though something was still off about her. Looking back at the other teen who as he returned his attention towards the kid in the black the human male's personality slightly changed.

"Two choices. You pack up and go the easy way. Or I'll have to beat some sense into you." were the words the other teen said to the teen in the cloak. The cloaked Teen was about to be willing to hear what the other teen had to say until this very point. The mask glew red and blue waves of the magic energy faster now as the runes changed on the mask, giving off a slight smile like shape as they continuously changed by each wave of glowing energy that passed by. The cloaked teen was angry by this annoying nuisances demands to leave his room and abandon his rightful territory... But he was also ecstatic and happy to hear the challenging words for starting a fight by the other kid.

Soon he noticed the other girl jump inside his room from the window, a strange girl though she also gave off a slight threat about telling a group known as the Justice League. The cloaked teen honestly couldn't care what she had to say though is was funny how she was the other teen's friend and yet she'd bet against him. "heh" Were the only words that came from the black cloaked teen as he looked at her with a short stare that screamed that he couldn't care about the justice league or the team he was in... just that he was here and ready to fight.

Looking back at the other teen again the mask continued to glow brightly continuously as he was getting in his fighting mindset as he looked at the distracted teen. His heart started to pump faster as his ecstatic energy and anger grew, the blood of magic pumped into the heart as his blood was beginning to burn with the energy. Soon his his left hand was growing a cold cloud of air around it as his right was engulfed in a bright flame. "Bring it." were the only words that came from the teen as he kept his focus on the speedster that the girl called KF. Soon the cloaked teen took two steps forward from left to right to flank the teen's right side as the cloaked teen punched first with his left hand towards KF's side as his right hand would punch his face as soon as his left hand pulled back, once that was finished he would do a quick move back then forward, this time at the teen's left while his right would backhand punch KF's face again before his left would throw the teen away. As the cloaked kid would back himself up towards the window in a more defensive position, ready for the kid to fight back if he was able to do such from the three unexpected hits the teen gave him. The mask glowed again, this time revealing the draconic eyes that were ready for the fight as he was in position for the counterattack. 'Focus... Don't lose your guard. He is fast and will be using that to his advantage. He will most likely flank my left by running at his right. If I can trip him he'll fall out the window. Don't let the other females distract me... Focus... keep control and stay calm... ' were the thoughts that ran through the teen's mind as he stared at KF, ready to move left for the trip or counter more than anything.

[Saarebas]

Geb was still laughing as he looked around the garage, something that must of annoyed Super boy by now. He was, to say the least, existed by the idea of a car for the team, even more by the thought that he might get to drive at all. Unfortunately he lost focus on his disguise and began to slowly melt into his true form. Hey turned and gave a sickening grin to Super boy, his mouth sliding down his face. "Think Sphere is really here?" Geb said in a wet, echoey voice. But before Geb could get an answer he noticed a series of taps on his back. Turning his head around, a full 180 degrees, he noticed he had been shot with darts. "What the? Oh hey it's you." He said to the girl he saw from earlier in a polite tone, though it came out squishy sounding. Before he could continue the girl threw a small egg shaped object that just shank into his chest. It only took a few moments before the grenade went off and blew the boy all over the garage, coating both Super boy and the girl the blew him up in thick layers of mud. The room was silent for a while before one of the globs of mud on the floor reshaped into Geb's head, with a angry expression plastered on it. "What the hell?!" He yelled at the girl.

[Spriggs27]

Sayaka couldn't dodge the mess that was made when Geb exploded from her grenade, some of him gotten into her eyes and she wiped her eyes out, she looked over to Geb who was only now a head speaking to her, she walked over to the head trying her best not to slip on what ever he was made out of, when she was at talking distance to the mud boy she looked down to the head with a straight face," I thought you were a monster that had gotten into the base and were gonna hurt one of my allies, but I was wrong, I would like to apologize and like for you to apologize as well." Sayaka said to the head on the ground, she then picked him up before he couldn't possibly look up her skirt.

[Saarebas]

Geb's was trying to look intimidating, which is quite hard when one is just a head, as the girl tried to explain her reasoning for attacking him. He was managing to calm down some by taking deep breaths, where to air was going he didn't know nor or care. He had almost settled when the girl asked for an apology. "Wait what? I'm all over a wall because of you and you want me to apologize? You're crazy!" The disembodied head of Geb barked at her. He was about to continue his shouting at her, but she picked him up before he could. "Hey what are you doing? I don't like being touched like this... Then again what use to be my legs are in your hair." Geb said with a slight smirk before regaining his scolding expression.

[Spriggs27]

Sayaka pointed one hand to her hair and then to her clothes, she didn't sniker or even crack a smile at Geb's lame joke about his legs, she just stood there looking at him with a blank face on her face," It's going to take me an hour or so to get rid of this mess in my hair, and I don't even know how I'm gonna clean my clothes up, that's why I am asking for an apology from you, but I am sorry if it's too much to ask for in your current condition." Sayaka said in her usual calm tone of voice, she didn't want to keep making him mad about being blown up, it was her fault for what happened to him.

[Saarebas]

Geb tried to stay angry the best he could, but it was never in his nature to hold a grudge. With a sigh and a role of his pitch black eyes Geb uttered in a soft, yet sincerer voice the single word sorry. He sat, or as best a head could sit, in the girl's hand for a moment before smiling some. "Well I really am sorry and you should use club soda and wash with old water to clean the mess. Gets ride of me awfully quick." He said smirking some. "But can you try to save as much of... well me as you can? It takes forever to regenerate from scratch." He said as he looked, as much as he could turn his head, at the bits and pieces of him that laid around. "I'm Geb by the way." He said before smiling at the girl again.

[Demon Shinobi]

Nathaniel was caught completely off guard by the sudden attack The first one caused more pain than it probably should have. The next one he had a bit more time to react too, but still took the blow. The final blow however, didn't land. It grazed him giving off the appearance that it's done more damage, but he was able to react much more easily with it and moved in tandem with the attack to make sure he wouldn't be hurt anymore than he had already been. He stopped and glared at the cloaked teen who eyes he could just now make out. "You little... Alright." He stopped and cracked his knuckles just before doing the same to his neck. "You wanna play? Let's play." He said as he charged head on at the dragon going full speed. Even though he wasn't that strong his speed would make what he had planned hurt way more. He assumed the idea in his opponent head would be to trip him out the window. But he had a better idea. Mid run Nathaniel turned right. He repeated this two more times until he's gone full circle and was heading for the teen with the mask again. It's probably confuse the crap out of him and if that worked then Nate would tackle him head on out the open window. And she thought a little distraction would make me less awesome. He thought in the middle of his little plan.

[Reaper]

Rachel finished her workout and left the gym only to see Kid Flash and the cloaked boy fighting. Rolling her eyes at the immature spectacle, she jumped and landed gracefully on the first floor, walking up to Robin. "Nice to see you again... Bats finally decided to let you come out and play?" Rachel greeted her acquaintance warmly with a handshake.

Turning back to the fight, she leaned against the doorway and called out to the two of them. There were systems designed to restrain hostiles if she remembered correctly, though for the life of her Shadow could not remember if Artemis mentioned how to trigger them. The only solution now was to either help one side win or get a member of the league involved.

"If you two don't stop I'm calling Batman!" She called out loudly. Considering the Bat was keeping tabs on her to make sure she wasn't a danger to the League or their little team of sidekicks here, it wasn't likely he would respond to her calls. Fortunately for her Robin was here then.

"Honestly, fighting over a stupid room." She murmured to herself.

[Dystopia]

Of course, if a mother gets a text message she's going to want a phone call. His mother was content after hearing his voice and rambled on about home and how awesome his brother was doing in law school and how Ember needed to remember to keep up with his studies if he ever wanted a career. She seemed to think his idea of being in musical and plays was absolutely ridiculous. After all, being a super hero was volunteer work. Ember needed a way to provide for himself and apparently he couldn't mooch off his brother because his mom had already called dibs.

So, like most teenagers, Ember decided to ignore his mother's warning and read. Reading was sort of like studying in the way it supposedly increased intelligence but had nothing at all to do with what he was learning at school. He was so absorbed into his book until he started to hear loud noises. And he really, really tired to ignore them. He even attempted to hum to himself so he would't have to leave the book he was reading. Unfortunately, whatever was going on downstairs didn't seem like it was going to end anytime soon. He placed the book under his arms and marched all the way doing to the living room.

The living room... where Nathaniel was in some territory disrupt with some guy? Honestly, what were they? Cavemen? Ember was slightly concerned about the living room's fate. If the team destroyed the room, then what? All they'd be doing is proving their were irresponsible, immature children and possibly get the base taken away. And there was no way after seeing the library, Ember was going to give this place up. So, he decided to play immature with immature. Not that Ember was mature himself; he still burped fire just so to stress his mom out.

Ember lifted the arm the book wasn't under and smirked as his hand caught fire. "Nathaniel and living room guy, I'm going to give you three seconds to quiet down so I can go back to reading. Or..." Ember threatened, his hand getting dangerously close to the wall. It was a bluff though. There was no way Ember could live for himself if he destroyed that library. And he was also pretty sure Ember's power had been considered during the construction of the base. But... there wasn't a reason for him to admit to the bluff. He just wanted them to be quiet. "So, what do you to say? Play nice with each other or burnt down base?" He asked with a smile.

[Avenger]

"Told you." Xaviere said in a quiet tone, the same smirk still on her face. She got from the window and stood by the corner, relaxing herself and slouching her shoulders. Though she was enjoying a lot of this, she did feel a bit bad about it. Poor Nathan, so easily distracted from his priorities. If only villains were as distracted, too... then again, perhaps they wouldn't really be much of a villain. A lot of people talked at once after KF was initially hit. She took a moment to put the two in her memory. One, her name was Rachel, to Xaviere's knowledge, and her alias was Shadow. The other was Ember, the one who could control fire and manipulate it...

She only offered a smile to Rachel at first, letting a deep sigh come from her chest. "It took a lot of persuading. And a bit of sneaking out." The girl Wonder commented, letting Rachel's next words sink in. Robin knew Batman wouldn't answer her calls. He'd take it to note of course, that she called him, but would probably consider such a call petty at the current time. If it was from her or KF, perhaps he'd have paid attention, but since he really didn't know any of the others on the team, he wouldn't pay it mind. Maybe not even if it was Nathan, but he knew she'd only call him for a purpose, never as a prank or for leisure. It didn't work like that. She had too much respect for him, and he had too much work to do.

All she could say when Ember had placed his hand near the wall was "No," ignoring what she was going to respond to Rachel with and instead, turning her attention to everyone else in the room, her smile fading. "Nobody is doing anything to the new base, are we clear, Ember? Especially burning it down. I'd suggest you don't even attempt, unless you want on the League's bad side, especially Batman's. Who, as a matter of fact, can handle this personally, it's out of our power to deal with disruptive team members, if they don't cooperate. Surely the only ones who could set him straight would be those in a higher level of authority than KF, anyway. Speaking of which..."

Robin turned her masked gaze to the two fighting, rolling her eyes. "KF, I'd think you should know better... you're not leaving a good first impression on the league as team leader by getting into a fight the first day. You might want to be a bit more careful. " Moving away from them, she started to walk out the door. "I'm sure it will go really well over with Flash and Bats..."

[Reaper]

"Well, now that you're here, if you want to come to my room and play..." Rachel replied with a wink as she leaned in and gave Robin a polite peck on the cheek. "Good luck with the boys..." She whispered conspiratorily in the girl's ear as she left to to take a shower. Knowing Kid Flash, that small peck on the cheeks was probably enough to give him a whole new slew of mental images.

"Well, I'm going to take a nice warm shower... alone." She commented a little too loudly to the room and winked as she turned and left with a sway of her hips. In all honesty, she had indulged her mischievous side enough and now all she wanted was to have some quiet time to herself.

She didn't know what really happened after she left but since the base hadn't burned down yet she assumed there was no emergency as she exited the shower and got dressed. There was a message on her phone. Your bike's been transported to the base. Have fun, kid.

Shadow smiled and sent a quick thank you message back. Her mentor was efficient despite all of Rachel's gripes about her. She got back into her combat suit and decided to tinker around with the bike to occupy her time. Five minutes later she was in the garage with a toolbox and fawning over her bike.

It had been a recent gift from Artemis and she hadn't had much opportunity to ride it or break it in, so Rachel was extremely excited to put it to use. "Hi, my sweet." She greeted her bike warmly and rubbed her cheeks against it as if she were hugging it. "I really need to pick a name for you soon."

[Drakel]

The KF's tackle was took the cloaked teen completely off guard as he was sent flying with the speedster out of the window, breaking it. As he was sent out of the window he could hear the threats from the other teammates, though the fact that KF managed to out strategize the cloaked teen made him think things were going to be more interesting. As he was sent flying as the speedster continued to run things were in a blur though the one thing the cloaked teen could see was a spot of ice that would have been left behind from the hit on the side, he knew that if the speedster continued to run and gained more speed, even the slightest throw would end his life. Things were getting fun and challenging to the teen as he placed his hand on the ice so that it could quickly grow down on the teen toward's his feet so he could trip before he could gain too much speed. While this was happening the Masked teen looked at the other teen and began to laugh as the two were now racing against time. "heh...hehehahahahaha...."

The ice was now growing at a faster speed towards the speedster's feet, though the nameless teen noticed that they were no longer near their base, but instead they were now inside the jungle. Trees were everywhere and as the colors of fruit and flowers could be seen almost everywhere inside the forest. The Teen still continued to laugh as he noticed that he was almost finished with tripping the other teen. If he succeeded the two would both fall, but if he failed he would be thrown onto the ground eventually.

The masked teen would be in the middle of a dry bare area with a bunch of dead plants and half living trees around the bare area. The teen would spin and hit the ground several times as he felt slightly dizzy from the backfire of his attack. A cloud of dust would be seen behind as he fell and spun on the ground. Slowly, while getting up he stopped for a second looking down as he looked back at KF. "Ow." Was the next thing he said as the nameless, cloaked teen got up and tried to get back into his normal fighting stance.